Use, use & re-use: Leftbank Building

Photo of the Hazelwood Building, courtesy of Leftbank.

On a recent taping of Outlook Portland [along with the more well-spoken and clever Brian Libby from Portland Architecture and Cafe Unknown's Dan Haneckow] host Rick Emerson asked me what my favorite Portland building was. Easy question: The Weatherly Building on 516 SE Morrison Street. My answer was somewhere along the lines of “elegant, handsome and a landmark for me when I first moved here from Boston.”

I was also asked what my favorite Portland building was that no longer existed. The answer wasn’t so easy. Being a recent newcomer to Portland [six years!] I really have no emotional attachment to Portland’s architecture. I don’t have memories of hanging out at that one bar that’s no longer there or going shopping at some long-lost store with my parents when I was a kid like long-timers do.

So, my answer wasn’t as concrete as had hoped. I chose Hotel Portland. Built in 1890 and leveled in 1951 for a parking lot [and later Pioneer Courthouse Square so I guess that ultimately makes it a win?] the building was one of the first I became aware of that was unceremoniously mowed down in Portland. A perfectly usable building. It happens a lot here in Portland [enthusiastically starting with urban redevelopment in the 1950s] and it’s ultimately changing the landscape. How many architecturally significant building have met their demise since I’ve moved here? I’ve lost count.

I’m always stymied when a building is demolished. Why tear it down? I’m not naive to think that every building should be saved – and maybe there’s a good reason for demolition, such as crumbling infrastructure, irreversible repairs, or it’s full of lead and asbestos – but simply removing a perfectly sound building because some developer has a woody for a new design concept [and one that will be out of fashion in 20 years, hell, five years - I can spot a 2004 project pretty easily] has to have some sort of checks and balances with the city. I certainly don’t have an answer and don’t know the wonkiness behind what makes Portland officials tick and how projects get pushed through [cough neon rose cough].

Which brings us [finally] to the Leftbank project on Broadway. Get this: the developers took an existing [and historically significant space] and beautifully renovated it into a completely usable space.

I wrote about Leftbank for Neighborhood Notes a couple month’s back, [illustrated by Kenneth Aaron's wonderful photographs] and here’s a blurb:

Originally known as the Hazelwood Building [see above photo], designed and built by architect A.E. Doyle in 1923, the building has a fascinating and notorious history. Once housing a restaurant, creamery, candy manufacturer, the building then morphed into a restaurant, beer hall, stood vacant, and most recently housed manufacturing companies. But the most infamous tenant was the Dude Ranch in the 1940s—ground zero for Portland’s jazz scene in the 1940s that attracted local talent and some heavy national acts such as Lionel Hampton, Art Tatum, Nat “King” Cole and a young Thelonious Monk.

Wow, how lame [and really lazy] is quoting yourself from another source? Very, lame.

Anyhow, I guess my point is that older buildings have a place, especially in the tight Portland land market. Tearing down perfectly fine structures so a developer can build “sustainable” condos is ridiculous. That’s why when a project such as Leftbank launches and succeeds it should be applauded and encouraged.

Where have you gone, Allison LaRue?

I love getting emails like this. Last week, I heard from Apricot Irving from the Boise Voices project. Boise Voices is an oral history project that connects kids from Portland’s Boise neighborhood to the elders that lets them share and record stories on the history of the neighborhood.

The reason for Apricot’s email though was that she is discovered a cache of newspaper clippings and photographs of Allison Leroux [aka Allison LaRue] a dancer and performer in Portland in the 1950s.

According to Apricot [and the various clippings], Allison was a dancer at Amatos in the 1950s. She also performed with the Claydettes at the Monte Carlo. I’ve done posts on both of these nightclubs in the past.

Anyone out there know of Ms. LaRue’s whereabouts or want to share a memory?

Lost Vancouver, WA

So, what makes someone a part of a community? I always thought it was the neighborhood you lived in. You shop at the local [or nearby] stores, you go to parks by your home, and you get to know the neighbors and shopkeepers.

But, what about the neighborhood or area where you work – are you considered a part of the community? I’ve always, for the most part, worked in industrial parks or neighborhoods that had no connection to community and were only there for the purpose of Monday – Friday and providing food and goods to nearby office parks. On the occasional weekend day I would go in to work, the business parks would be abandoned. And forget about being able to stop by the deli to pick up a bite to eat.

However, the past few years my job has been in two distinct, bustling and alive neighborhoods in Portland: the Clinton Street area and then in the Belmont/Hawthorne area.

Each offered great options for food, coffee and picking up groceries for dinner. It was weird though. I always felt like I was invading the territory of the people who actually lived in the neighborhood. I felt like an imposter.

But then, it dawned on me that I was there five days a week, all day. I gave back to the community. I even visited on my off days to shop. It was like having two separate lives, one at home and one at work.

Each day I’d also took a break and would walk and explore each neighborhood, enjoying the walk, doing a little house porn watching. The streets around the Hawthorne, Belmont and Clinton were very quiet – most of the homeowners were gone – most likely at their own jobs, in other neighborhoods.

And now I’m working in downtown Vancouver, second exit off of I-5. On my way in, I see glimpses of downtown Portland, the race track, the Expo Center in my rearview mirror, and get to go the speed limit since I’m going against the traffic coming INTO Portland. [I originally checked with Amtrak to see if they offered some sort of commuter deal - ya know, take the bus to the downtown Portland train depot, hop on a train, then walk the mile to work. No dice. ]

But back to the commute. Passing the Expo Center I see the Interstate Bridge looming, knowing I’m close. Two exits later, down Broadway, I’m in a different state and city. Welcome to Vancouver, WA, baby! Home of the original Burgerville! Pump your own gas, bitches! Sales tax! Phone booths on the corner!

But, laugh all you want Portlanders – downtown Vancouver is, well, kind of cool. My only myopic vision of Vancouver was being stuck in horrific traffic in horrific Fishers Landing one time long ago and a vague recollection of that mysterious round senior housing building.

Downtown Vancouver though? Different story. My work takes me to an area called Uptown Village, where its Main Street is bustling.  There’s ample parking. From my work, I can walk to a coffee shop owned by two “twentysomethings” according to the newspaper clipping they have on the wall [they serve a killer Americano - using Stumptown]. There’s a record store – a record store that sells tamales from the back room. Antique stores here and there. A Mexican joint and a bookstore [any bookstore that has an "oddities section" gets a thumbs up].

Truthfully, I have no idea what’s on either end of Main Street – it could be a 100 foot waterfall plunge or end of the earth or an eight-lane expressway. I’m myopic remember?

But that one strip? It rocks.

So, here I am again – a visitor that feels like someone invading. I pick up the Vancouver Voice and read about the local issues or events that take place after 5 pm  or on weekends, chat with the pizza store owner while waiting for a slice, check out the flyers for events [some in the hood, some over in Portland] on the tattoo shop windows, ponder about visiting the local brewpub or wonder what’s up with Governor Gregoire. But, then I split for home, cross the bridge and remember that I can’t pump my own gas.

I plan on doing some hardcore, lunch hour pedestrianism/ flâneurism and veer off to some of the side streets though during the week. Vancouver, you kind of fascinate me.

Paul's on Broadway

The Palais Royale Ballroom: Where They Danced for Joy

A couple weeks ago I received an email from Cherie Cheney Nomura who mentioned that her father, Ed Cheney, once owned a ballroom on Burnside in Portland in the 1940s.

Would I be interested in a few photos from the ballroom she inquired? “Absolutely,”  was my answer.

She took the time to dig out photos, newspaper clippings and other memorabilia and made copies of everything for me. Even better, she composed a document about her father’s ballroom that I am re-printing [pretty much verbatim] and am using as the kick-off for my oral history project.

Thanks Cherie – hopefully the memories of your father’s ballroom will inspire others to share their own stories about the place and about Portland and Oregon.

Once located at 2115 West Burnside, the ballroom had many different names before my father bought it in 1944, including DeHoney’s Ballroom, the Uptown Ballroom and finally the Palais after he purchased it.

The ballroom was open six nights each night with a designated dance. Some of the types and styles included Old Timers which meant old structured dances such as Schottische, Varsovienne, Viennese Waltz, Polka, the Quick Step, and the Peabody.

These were full houses of accomplished dancers who knew the intricate steps and patterns of these dances. Another designation was “modern,” which meant jitterbug, foxtrot, Balboa, swing, glides and waltzes.

Latin was also popular and included rhumba, Bolero, tango, samba, merengue, salsa, cha cha cha, Paso Doble, Mambo and Bossa Nova.

Dancers included older and younger adults, married couples, singles, high school and college students, service men and women. Many couples would arrive separately and meet up to dance – it was usual for men and women to arrive alone.

The building
The ballroom was almost half of a block size with three floors. The street level housed a Chinese restaurant, a cleaners, a variety store and a books store. To enter the ballroom, dancers walked up a long ramp from the street level up to the second floor. At the entry to the ballroom was the cashier’s booth and inside the large double doors was the coat check room, the office. cafeteria, the ladies “lounge,” and men’s room.

Stairs led to the third story which was entirely a ballroom floor of very fine hardwood. There was a bandstand for the house band at one end and alcoves on each side of the bandstand.

On each side of the bandstand was a reader board that announced the next dance.

One alcove side was for the single women and the other side for single men. Couples could sit on the leather benches that were around the edges of the ballroom. Some dances were called “Men’s choice,” and the men would go to the ladies’ alcove and select a partner and vice versa.

View Larger Map

[Scooch around the map a bit - I believe the old site is now the parking lot of the Subway franchise.]

No booze, no cars and lots of fashion
No alcohol was served at the ballroom. Hungry dancers could eat sandwiches, dessert and drink coffee at the cafeteria or enjoy a soda at the soda fountain. People would also occasionally step out to their cars for a quick shot of alcohol though a cop guarded the entrance door to ensure no one showed up inebriated.

Many dancers [and Portlanders in general] only had one car or no car. Many of the dancers arrived by bus are taxi. There was a taxi stand out front and uniformed taxi drivers would line up to take home the dancers at the end of the evening.

Coats and ties were expected for men – with a supply of coats and ties available in the coat room for those who didn’t have them. Service men and women could wear their uniforms – and being the WWII era – there were lots of them.

Young people in high school and college could wear their “clean school clothes” and all women were required to wear skirts – no slacks or jeans.

Famous performers for the dancers at the ballroom included Tex Benneke, Wayne King [The Waltz King]. Other celebrities that performed at the ballroom but not for the dancers included Stan Kenton, Red Buttons, Billy Eckstein, The Mills Brothers, and Louis Armstrong and his All Stars.

The demise of the ballroom? Rock and/or roll
By the mid-1950s dancing styles and lifestyles went through some huge changes. TV became available and people started to stay home. The large dance floors were not necessary for the new dance styles such as the Twist where partners weren’t generally needed for the “free form” dancing. The public for the most part lost interest in more traditional ballroom dances in favor of inhibited, unpartnered, unstructured, extemporaneous “dancing.”

Fortunately for my father, he sold the ballroom just before the demise of grand ballrooms. The new owners allowed alcohol and smoking, no dress code was required and the formal dance band was replaced with very loud electronic music and youthful “rock” bands took over. The building was eventually closed and then demolished because it was a nuisance, dangerous and was so poorly maintained.

Sidenote: Cherie also handed over a 1945 issue of The Oregonian that highlighted her dad’s ballroom. Below is a scan from the article about young couples doing the Portland Walk, described by the writer:

“The Portland Walk is the favorite with the younger disciples of Terpsichore these days. Garbed in Levis, rolled high, the young men steer their companions around the floor, apparently oblivious to others in the spacious ballroom. The young lady’s back is bent backward in a manner that seems to threaten the spine, but the walk apparently is popular. The Levi and bobby-sock brigade also get hep on the jitterbug numbers.”

Also, a Google search came up with this article about a riot in 1960 at the ballroom when Ray Charles didn’t show up to a scheduled show.

The Lost Oregon Oral History Project

This has been brewing for quite some time.

Sure, I love our architecture, buildings, streetscapes, wacky hotels and roadside oddities that all make Oregon a wonderful place we call home.

But, something strange happened along the way.

People started commenting [as I would hope, this being a blog, ya know?] about their experiences with the buildings or the postcards I was scanning and posting.

Here are some comments from the many that I wanted to use to illustrate the illuminating [and to them maybe even mundane but to me, fascinating memories]:

• I have two souvenirs from the Oregon Centennial. A cup and saucer printed with the official logo and scenes. But I also  have a printout from our first “computer” experience. Pacific Power and Light Company had a  Burroughs 205 “Computer” set up. If you typed in your name and the year you were born, it  printed out the events going on in Oregon that year.
• My father was the structural engineer who designed the Civil Defense Operations Center at Kelly Butte. Before it opened he took us to see it. I remember seeing the Diesel generators, the vaulted control room with the big map on the wall, the bunk rooms, the kitchen, the decontamination area. To a little kid, nuclear war looked like an exciting adventure.
• The Music and Art Fair ( 1971?) at the stadium featured a ton of great rock bands, but no money to pay them. Highlight was Bo Diddley punching out the promoter, then Bo’s girlfriend punching out the promoters wife.
• The Carriage Room Burlesque ( strip) joint on Broadway, that up through the 70’s still featured a comic with every performance. Roberts Rod & Reel downtown, Mort Sahl, Sammy Davis, Jr. and many others played there.
• Frank Zappa told me once backstage at the Paramount that Portland was the weirdest place on earth. I think Frank may have been right! In a good way.
• My mother worked as the hostess at Amato’s around 1957-1961. I was only at Amato’s once, as I recall. Had an Elvis Presley (green colored drink for kids) and my sisters had a (pink) Shirley Temple. My mother used to bring home photos of the people who performed at Amato’s (Sammy Davis Jr., likely the only non-white person in the club, among them). She met my stepfather at Amatos. He managed the Owens-Illinois glass plant out near the airport (still there) and took us to dinner at the Aero Club from time to time. Finger bowls were a new one for me.

Their memories were filling in the gaps for me – from earlier decades I was too young to remember to later decades I was not living in Oregon yet. It made the history snap alive. And I thought, if they weren’t commenting on my blog, we’re their memories and recollections lost for all time?

Oregon is well documented up to about WWII. We’re set with the Oregon Trail, the depression and Lewis and Clark information. After that it becomes a bit fuzzy. Sure, OHS has their well-researched  journal and exhibits and there are educated and professional historians doing lots of leg work. But it’s all way too big-picture for me. I want to hear the daily experiences from Oregonians. I’m keen on the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s [especially the Nixon years and then 1977 - the punk years]. Call it guerilla history. Or storytelling.

There are a couple of ways I want to approach this. I invite you to share with me via email your memories in the comment sections or by emailing me.

I also have a tape recorder, video recorder and plan on interviewing and posting audio and video files and transcripts from my interviews, of which I have a couple in the works [one with a gentleman born in Portland in 1931]. Whether this stays as Lost Oregon or morphs into a different blog remains to be seen.

Thanks Oregon!

The Dill Pickle Club

I’m surprised I haven’t run into the Portland-based Dill Pickle Club group yet, but better late than never. I met with one the founders, Marc Moscato, last week and we chatted about local history, WPA projects, hobos and Chicago in the 1930s.

The club’s namesake originates from Jazz-Age Chicago’s legendary yet ill-forgotten speakeasy, founded in 1914 by labor organizer Jack Jones, Jim Larkin and Ben “Clap Doctor” Reitman. The Pickle was the heart of the “Chicago Renaissance” and the meeting spot for the city’s most noted authors, musicians and activists, including Sherwood Anderson, Ben Hecht, Mary MacLane, Lucy Parsons, Kenneth Rexroth and Carl Sandburg. It closed its doors in 1934.

According to their web site, the club will host a monthly presentation series in “which academics, zinesters, political activists, artists and people of every political shade under the sun can come together to examine life as we know it. Presentations will be controversial, offbeat and intellectual, and provide an experimental format to critique contemporary politics, culture and humanities.”

Marc’s an interesting guy and has done some fantastic work, including the film The More Things Stay The Same that examines the life and world of Dr. Ben Reitman (1879-1942), known in his day as “the Clap Doctor,”  “King of the Hoboes” and “the most vulgar man in America.”

As part of their Field Trip series, they have planned is a bike ride next Sunday, June 28, that will explore Portland area WPA projects. Unfortunately the ride sold out quickly so they might add another ride the following week if there’s enough interest. Send an email to yes@dillpickleclub.com if interested.

I’m looking forward to more great work from this group- they’re a wonderful addition to the Portland landscape.

Welcome Oregonian readers

Thanks for stopping by after reading the piece by Peter Carlin. Poke around, check things out and please comment – I’d love to hear your memories.

Thanks!

Halfway, Ore., renaming and branding

Mayor: Hey, the photographer for the postcard company is going to be here tomorrow to take some shots of our town.

City manager: Well, let’s spruce it up a bit – we can get some paint from Johnson’s old farmhouse – make ‘er look nice.

Councilperson: Um, the photographer came yesterday.

Postcard photographers were like Google Street View cars nowadays- ya never know when they’re gonna swoop in and start snapping.

And Halfway? Remember them from the late 1990s? They sold the naming rights to their town to Half.com, Ore.

Here’s a great update by Design Observer from a couple years back that gives the lowdown on the hows and whys of renaming your town – and going so far as to let a company buy your rights or choosing other  ill-fated names.

Here’s a graf from the article:

Other towns have reconfigured their identities by renaming their towns themselves. Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania renamed itself Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania in 1954, when the widow of the sports star agreed to bury him there. in 1950, the town of Hot Springs, New Mexico, renamed itself Truth or Consequences — after the game show by the same name. More recently, Ismay, Montana changed its name to Joe, Montana — hoping to build profitably upon the name of the football superstar by the same name.

Don’t get me started on city taglines, either. I’m not the biggest fan of taglines in general ["committed to exceptional service," "price, value, service."] Ugh. If you’re going to write a tagline, make it relevant to the brand at least. Or make it memorable.

Regardless, here are the Tagline Guru’s  The Top 50 U.S. City Slogans.

Oh, and Halfway? Nowadays it looks like a friendly, well-kept Oregon small town. The town took the Half.com money and used it to renovate their town. Kudos, Halfway!